THIS IS PUJA's TEST FILE. It should not be misconstrued with his first release. This is meant to give players a look into what will be in the first 2008-9 release. He has not yet released an official 2008-9 file.

Originally Posted by puja21:

i'm actually going to post some test files here in this thread later tonight, just so people can see the new STM/AGG changes & the coverage boosts & I can get feedback on how it plays compared to last season....so here's some info on the file you'll see in a couple hours:

--PBP should be 100% accurate as should DOB--faces for all rookies should be dead on (check obscure guys even as I compared real-life headshots to all the available in-game possibilities... so you'll have Roy Williams WR face on Aquib Talib, or Phil Rivers on Matt Ryan etc)--depth charts will be completely unrefined as it's in progress (i havent yet changed the POS for veterans, so Takeo Spikes still OLB, Brooking ILB, Eugene Wilson not a CB, etc)--about 100 players will be missing still... you will see all drafted rookies & about 75 extra who were in my draft class from last year.^missing players: about a dozen rookies & 75 vets who didnt play in 2007 (Pacman Jones etc)--transactions: pretty much all veterans who moved teams are taken care of as of Sept 13 (still a few guys to be cut/signed) One big one that isnt up-to-date I know offhand is that I havent signed or boosted JT OSullivan yet

Again this is just to get some feeback on gameplay & I encourage you to check PBP, appearance, DOB either in-game or in the editor as this should be virtually 100% accurate

AGG is now a legit rating for DL LB & safety: set based on % of team's defensive "plays ended" league wide (tackle, pass deflected INT FF etc). I'll bring more of the details w/ the real posting in a few days. just throwing something up there for now

LDR & CMP for non-QB/P/K was initially baseline derived from experience; eg if there are two equal players, the older player will have better LDR for the most part

you'll notice some bottom tier players (esp rookies) are very low rated, although none below 55 OVR... although many will rise, there are some that will stay low for good reason & i'll explain that with the intial posting

PS Im not a big sliders tweaker but for what it's worth im using the sliders i had saved under "custom" in the 2007 franchises i posted w/ one diff; CPU passing set to the max

EDIT: sorry, just fixed up a couple more things & reupped so ppl can DL & play a few teams quickly. the following teams have "passable" depth charts for the time being although as I said, vets who changed pos are still out of position (so they are at the bottom of their old slot). Guys like Spikes/Ulrich, the Bengals OL, etc. These are the ratings derived from last season's play so you'll still have 07 bench players who are now starters rated ahead of guys now sitting; ex Parys Harlason made fewer plays last year but has now passed Banta-Cain on the DC.

So it's 49ers Bears Bengals Bills Falcons are unfinished but perfectly playable if you want to just DL & go

TEST VERSION 4 NOTES:

Test4.0

All 32 depth charts now set from www.Localsports.ca/NFL_rosters^so if you have questions any about why a guy is a FS vs SS, DT vs DE, etc this is why 99% of the time. Sometimes I'll switch it if a real-life POS change was made due to injury. For instance, if a team moved a tackle inside to replace an injured guard, I'll usually leave him as a tackle since there is no injury in the game's roster. Also, keep in mind that there are already over 150 players on IR/PUP/susp/commisioner's exemption at this point of the season that have expanded the real-life rosters of all 32 teams well above the 53-man roster cap, so some players who are in roster file may be in free agency rather than on their team b/c there are only 54 max allowed per roster in the game. Basically, I had to take a liberty here or there & decide who to cut. With the exception of a missing kicker/punter for 3 or 4 teams.. these rosters should be good for testing & should hopefully play well in exhibtion. Any gameplay feedback pos or neg is welcome at this point

All position changes have been made according to localsports.ca^So, Takeo Spikes is an ILB, Eugene Wilson a CB, Quinton Ganther moved to FB, BAL G/C Chris Chester now a tight end, Stewart Bradley/Gaither moved inside/outside respectively, Ryan Kalil & Chris Myers back to center, Corey Williams from 4-3 DT to a 3-4 DE, Raheem Brock to DE, Ty Brayton back outside to DE, Michael Pittman to FB, Michael Griffin from CB back to natural pos of FS, DJ Williams back outside where he belongs, etc etc...

At this point all ratings are still as follows: veterans are based on their 2007 metrics & no changes have yet been made to indicate offseason decline. For example, no accounting yet for Brian Young dropping behind Kendrick Clancy on New Orleans' depth chart, Jon Jansen falling behind Stephon Heyer on the Redskins' depth chart, or Willie Anderson being unable to surpass Adam Terry despite being a 2007 league leader in adjusted avg line yards (meaning: despite Anderson being a good run blocker in 2007).

worth noting too: again, since all veterans are based on 2007 metrics, I also havent yet made any adjustments to those who made position changes. So, cornerbacks now playing safety still have AGG 1 & CTH 2-5 instead of 10... basically, players still have the constraints of their previous position. This could cause a player's overall rating to be very low or overly high at this point. For instance, Chris Chester still has his center attributes despite being a tight end now in Baltimore. Vonnie Holliday has his DT ratings despite now being a 3-4 end for MIA (being a DE boosts him significantly compared to a DT). For all SS moving to FS, their ratings have skyrocketed because the FS OVR-rating calculation is one of the simplest in the game; basically if you are a terrible CB or terrible SS you'll still be a marginal FS... so, players like Michael Huff & Laron Landry who played down in the box last season (at least until Taylor's death in the case of Landry) got huge boosts just from the pos change to FS. Of course this will all be taken care of in the finished product, but I just thought I'd mention it as some ratings may still look very odd.

2008 RookiesAt this early stage, rookie-ratings are all still based on the combination of pre-draft scouting sources & the players' draft positions.. this is from back around draft time, before mini-camp battles were waged & long before the results of this first month in the season. This means that attribute boosts have not yet been applied to the likes of:Matt Forte being legit, Flynn outplaying Brohm, Chris Horton becoming a playmaker, Tim Hightower/Steve Slaton being factors in their backfields, ditto for Eddie Royal/Donnie Avery, etc... ^This is why it's still beta

Free Agency / RetirementI think I did a good job of weeding out the highest-rated unsigned players from free agency so far. You won't see the long-retired 80 to 90+ OVR rated guys like Jonathan Ogden, Mack Strong, Sean Taylor, Larry Allen, Michael Strahan, Warren Sapp, Daunte Culpepper, Ted Washington, McNair in there that you often see peppered into new roster files. I have about 150 new players still to add to the file, so that many more players will still be replaced in free agency (starting with long-snappers probably; all in F/A right now). Also, I'll need to lower any remanining 75-80+ rated free agents obviously, but it's nice to see unsigned/unretired guys who recently had success like Ty Law, Rosie Colvin, Hollis Thomas, LeCharles Bentley etc available to be signed in F/A without having outrageous ratings. I know of a few retired players I still need to remove: Rod Smith, Jerametrius Butler, David Pollack, Quinn Pitcock... I'll probably be overwritting most unsigned F/A as the season goes on & players continue to be signed off the street/practice squads to replace IR guys.^Please let me know if you see any more retired players I missed & left in F/A besides those 4

All jersey #'s set according to localsports.ca: That is a great site @ staying on top of these things... compare it to ESPN or CBS etc where dozens of players still have a blank on the website where their jersey # should be listed. LS.ca had only ONE player out of 1700+ without a jersey #; Miami injured reserve TE Aaron Halterman. Many have missed the dozens of players who didn't switch teams this offseason, yet still changed their jersey # (sometimes a # opens up or a new player wants someone else's jersey # like Asante Samuel taking Joselio Hanson's #22); this list includes Julian Peterson (now #98 instead of #59), Alama-Francis, Manny Ramirez, Pete Kendall, Andre Frazier, Marcus McCauley, Aundrae Allison, Baraka Atkins, Michael Bush, Justin Miller, D'Qwell Jackson, Jay Alford & many many others. These should all be correct, so if I missed any let me know

Players not yet added to the fileThese are the ~150 players I still need to add in to complete the file... Many of them are on IR & most are just deep reserves, but a few-- like Antonio Bryant & Pacman Jones-- are significant. I'm sure there are a few players I missed &/or a few who were signed since I checked my file up against the NFLs active lists; so please let me know of any I didn't catch here in this thread or by PM

People were asking about sliders... Although I'm not a huge sliders guy (i'm constantly tweaking, but not with too much science), I guess you could call the second attachment "my sliders"-- since it's what I've been playing on lately. A few ppl stumbled on them in my franchise & said they played well, but obviously that depends heavily on your play style.

If anyone wants to help, please just let me know if you come across any PBP, DOB, jersey # or years exp errors.. there really shouldnt be much as I used a spreadsheet to compare it to the data of CBSsportsline.com (not because it's especially accurate, but rather it's the only site that had all DOB, years exp, & jersey # easily importable into excel in table format). Anyway, if everyone just glanced at there favorite/hometown team, any errors that existed from CBSSportsline or still managed to slip past past me would probably jump off the page at them... eg JohnTesch would probably immediately notice Redskins mistakes, Dan the 49ers, Bloc the Raiders, etc^I havent yet done any "name-changes" (Chad Ocho Cinco, Juqua Parker, Dante Hughes) etc yet because I still need the names to match my 2007 roster to use the import tool a few more times.